Worship Tech Tour | The Belonging Co. | Keys and Tracks

Welcome back to our continued Worship Tech Tour Series featuring The Belonging Co. 

This post covers all things keys and tracks within The Belonging Co.’s setup. For the fullest explanation of how all the hardware and software works together, it’s best to watch the video above of The Belonging Co.’s Music Director, Evan Fernald, walking through everything in detail. This is the too long; didn’t watch post. In other words, here’s a tight-packed list of The Belonging Co.’s setup as a quick-reference guide. 

---

Do you want to improve your church’s ability to use tracks and keys to the best of your ability? Stewarding these tools can be hard. We want to help coach you and/or your keys players. Check out Worship Ministry School, where we have created courses on all things Ableton, MainStage, Keys, and more. We also offer one-on-one coaching. Let us help you today!

---

 Who is The Belonging Co.?

PRESENCE OVER PRESENTATION. INTIMACY OVER INDUSTRY. PEOPLE OVER POSITION. ENCOUNTER OVER ENTERTAINMENT.

JESUS OVER EVERYTHING.

That is The Belonging Co.’s mantra. 

The church began with their lead pastors, Henry and Alex Seeley, opening up their home for worship in 2012 after taking a leap of faith and moving from their home of Melbourne, Australia to Nashville. Their hearts were drawn to those who didn’t have a church home because of the fluid schedule of so many whose lives revolved around a touring schedule. By the Lord’s grace, he drew a people together, and The Belonging Co. began. 

Now, The Belonging Co. holds services at two campuses along with its online ministry, has a thriving worship ministry, and even offers college degree programs for students.

Tracks Rig

Most churches have their keys player or drummer running their tracks. This is not the case for The Belonging Co. In fact, they have their own dedicated tracks setup and team to run the tracks. Obviously, most churches won’t have the volunteer or financial bandwidth to pull something like this off, but this setup can serve as inspiration as churches grow in their ability to run tracks effectively. 

Hardware

16 inch Macbook Pro running Ableton 10 Standard 

This is the central hub for all the tracks The Belonging Co. uses during their worship sets. It runs Ableton 10 standard as the Digital Audio Workstation (DAW), and it generates all the sounds and click tempo that the church and the worship team hear.  

The track sessions themselves are built out in an interesting way. Every week begins with a file that holds a “master session” with every single song and every single stem (stems are like each instrument of a song) in one big, long session. From the master session, they then pull out all the songs not needed for a set and keep only the songs they do need. They may also keep a few upbeat songs in case the pastor requests to end on a high note. Then, midi controls are programmed to trigger all of the different elements of the software like starting, stopping, moving to the next song, etc.

Korg nanoKontrol 2

This is a very common midi controller device with faders and knobs that can be used to control many different elements of a rig. Notice below that the keys player has their own nanoKontrol as well. For the tracks rig, this nanoKontrol is used to adjust volumes and filters. 

OWC Thunderbolt 3 hub

It’s a thunderbolt hub. Not much to explain here. It allows everything to connect to the Mac.

Focusrite Clarett 8Pre

-       Run 10 outputs, 6 for the tracks

Whenever any sound needs to go from a computer to the mixer, an interface is needed. In this case, The Belonging Co. uses this device to send its sound across multiple channels for ultimate control. This is extreme. Most churches can get away with simple stereo outputs, but more inputs can be helpful for mixing, depending on the complexity. 

TouchOSC (on iPad) as a virtual midi controller

Traditional midi controllers like the KORG nonoKontrol help control various elements. However, it can be helpful to design an always-customizable interface to control things as well. This is the power of the app TouchOSC.

Boss DB-90

The Belonging Co. uses this basic metronome as a backup click in the case that the tracks software glitches or crashes. What’s more impressive is that the crew figured out a way to sample the click sound from Ableton and play it through the DB-90, so the band would have no idea that the click switched from Ableton to the DB-90. 

Keys Rig

Hardware

Korg nanoKontrol 2

See above

Focusrite Clarett 8Pre

See above

iConnect MIDI 4+

This device allows an ipad or other midi controller to communicate with multiple computers at the same time. 

Nord Stage 2 EX

The piano itself is the most important piece of gear in a keys rig. Nord has consistently provided reliable support with the most authentic feel. Even the sounds within the keyboard itself are used, Evan Fernald says, along with patches from the player’s library. 

iConnect mioXM

This is what the midi from the Nord Keyboard goes to, where the midi is sent to the broadcast room for ultimate control and editing.

Software 

TouchOSC (on iPad) as a virtual mini controller

See above. In addition to being a controller, notes for the music director and details about the flow of the songs are listed here as well.

Abelton and Mainstage

It turns out that about half of the keys players use Ableton while the other use Mainstage, and this decision is left up to the keys players themselves as they develop their own unique sounds. 

---

We hope this list of gear and links can help point your church in the right direction as you build and improve your keys and tracks rigs! As always, know that the Churchfront team is ready to help with specific needs and training through our Worship Ministry School and other programs. Also, be sure to stay on top of our YouTube and other blog content. We’re here to serve your church.

The Ultimate Guide to Worship Keys in 2021

Technology moves fast. And the technology around a keyboard setup for worship in 2021 is no exception. This is why Churchfront teamed up with David Pfaltzgraff, the founder and lead designer of Sunday Sounds, to equip churches with the easiest, cleanest, and most excellent keyboard rig possible. 

This post covers two main areas of the keyboard rig: the hardware and the software. We’ll walk through all the equipment a church needs to purchase or upgrade, and this will be followed by a walkthrough of how David Pfaltzgraff’s Sunday Keys template provides the best keyboard solution for churches.

Who is David Pfaltzgraff?

David is the founder of sundaysounds.com. As a worship leader at his church, David wanted to equip his volunteers with the easiest keyboard solution possible. Specifically, he wanted his volunteers to run Mainstage by Apple, but the problem with Mainstage was that it is not easy to navigate out of the box. So David has worked over the last five years to create custom sounds tailored specifically for worship, and he’s created a full suite of templates to use within Mainstage that makes navigating keyboard sounds simple and easy. 

David is also one of Churchfront’s instructors within Worship Ministry School, where he walks through all the details of setting up a church’s keyboard rig. So if this post is helpful for you and your team, consider enrolling in Worship Ministry School Today! 

The Case for Using a Computer Instead of a Keyboard’s Built-in Sounds.

Churches are looking to software (using a computer) instead of a keyboard’s built-in options because the software option is the path of least resistance when it comes to duplicating the keyboard sounds of songs a church desires to cover. It can be cumbersome to try to recreate iconic keyboard sounds of the latest worship songs out there using a dated keyboard with limited options built-in. But rigging up a computer with software like Mainstage or Ableton allows a church to use their existing keyboard with relative simplicity. It can also demolish the learning curve needed for a volunteer to run the keyboard rig. 

Breakdown of Keyboard Rig

Simplicity is the key. With this in mind, there are only three essential components to a modern worship keyboard rig. 

1.     A computer that can run the software and create the actual audio

2.     A keyboard that can send data to a computer

3.     An interface that can send the computer’s sound to the sound board

Component 1) A Computer That Can Run the Software and Create the Actual Audio 

To run Mainstage, a mac is required. Don’t own a Mac and concerned about the price? Here’s the good news: Macs with enough power to run Mainstage have never been more affordable. David has noted that, even one year ago, the macs he suggested churches purchase cost twice the cost as ones that can handle the work now. A Macbook Air with an M1 chip and 16gb of RAM for around $1,200 should be fine. The Mainstage software itself is only $30, so the bulk of a church’s budget will be put toward a computer to run this software. 

PC users, don’t fear. Although Mainstage is only for Macs, Ableton Live is cross-platform and runs well on PCs. What’s more, David and his team has Ableton-ready templates for PC users. 

Component 2) A Keyboard That Can Send Data to a Computer

Once the computer is ready to go with software like Mainstage or Ableton, the computer needs to be told what the keyboard player wants it to do. It’s needs to be “controlled.” So for that, it needs a midi controller. Here’s the great news. Probably 99% of churches out there already have a midi controller – the keyboard. Any modern keyboard that has build-in sounds can probably send midi data to a computer. So rather than using the built-in sounds in the keyboard itself, the keyboard is functioning as a controller and telling the computer, “hey, play these notes for this long at this certain volume.” 

Component 3) An Interface That Can Send the Computer’s Sound to the Sound Board

Now it’s time to connect the computer to the sound console. Churches can use the headphone jack to get started and test things out, but ultimately, David recommends purchasing an audio interface. What’s an audio interface? Essentially, it’s a device that sends audio audio out of the computer with a clean signal and provides multiple outputs that can be sent to the sound console. 

There are several interface options. The simplest is to purchase Radial USB Pro. It provides two stereo outputs and is simple to hook up and use. Another more professional option is to use a USB to AES50 converter to get multiple channels of audio being sent over a digital audio protocol. 

Bonus Keyboard Rig Accessory

Navigating keyboard software can still be hard. The idea is to be able to use the software as an extension of the keyboard instrument itself. So a great way to aid the keyboard player when using this setup is to provide them with an extra controller that can modify the software while the keyboard is being played. David suggests investing in the Korg NanoKONTROL 2. It’s $75 on Amazon. Essentially, it’s just a bunch of knobs and faders, but this paired with Sunday Sounds’ custom-designed decal that can overlay the device gives the keyboard volunteer a ton of visual reference as they play. Using a controller like this creates a learning standard that any player can implement on any keyboard. 

How Sunday Keys Works 

Mainstage is a powerful musical tool designed to make the most out of the keyboard. However, Mainstage wasn’t created for Worship music. Some sounds that come with Mainstage are great, but there are many that are pointless and a church will never use as well. To top it off, it could take many, many hours for someone to learn the software from scratch. It’s not easy for someone who doesn’t dabble in music software to understand the process quickly. 

This is where David and his team have saved churches all those hours of figuring our Mainstage and have created the Sunday Keys template.

Opening up Sunday Keys for the first time reveals that this template was designed specifically for worship ministry, and all the color coding matches the Sunday Sounds NanoKONTROL skin. Sunday Keys comes with a big library of patches that can be layered on top of one another, and this is where the NanoKONTROL can be used well. 

The workflow is easy to follow. All the confusion and headache of learing new software is removed, and each volunteer can be empowered to use the same software for every song and set. 

And, most importantly, all the patches (the different sounds) are tailor-made for worship music. David even went to his mom’s house and recorded her old piano that had a unique upright-piano sound for worship. The Sunday Sounds team has spared nothing to bring churches the best sounds for their worship. 

So much more could be said in explaining the value of Sunday sounds and Churchfront’s recommendations for it. But at this point, the best use of your time is to watch the second half of Jake’s interview with David himself as David walks through a live demonstration of the Sunday Keys template. Check out the YouTube Video above. 

Wrapping Up

So that’s a quick walkthrough on how to setup the easiest keyboard rig for 2021. Again, if this was helpful for you and you desire to equip your church and worship team with even more tools, consider enrolling in Churchfront’s Worship Ministry School where David and a host of other instructors guide worship leaders and volunteers through the process of leading worship well.